Biking thoughts

I started biking again largely inspired by teaching my daughter, and mostly for fitness purposes, but I've got to admit these early morning rides are a blast.  Just flying along the trail (the road riding is only fun when there are few/no cars around)... It's quite a feeling.

We'll see if I keep it up, but I've gotten some cold-weather clothes on sale, lately, so I'm prepared for winter biking.  I must admit to being scared of the possibility of lots of snow, however; I'm not sure how to handle that.

One thing I did see this morning, that was kind of amusing, was someone that had four lights on their bike (three of which were directed... poorly, and the fourth was blinking) and another on their head.  I understand wanting to be seen, but that's just begging to blind people going the other direction.

I'm wondering what to do with my light, actually.  I have it directed only about ten feet in front of the bike, but I still do see a few people covering their eyes.  And I go fast enough that even having it aimed that close can be problematic (I had to slow down several times this morning because I couldn't see far enough ahead).

I wish there was a bike light with some sort of baffle that would allow blocking the light (hopefully redirecting more downwards) that would shine into people's eyes, while allowing a good amount of brightness on the ground.  I'll have to look around, I guess.

Practical lighting

Most of the photography books have been long on theory, and short on practicality, but a book I just ran across breaks that trend quite well.  The book is Shooting in Sh*tty Light: The Top Ten Worst Photography Lighting Situations and How to Conquer Them (yeah, the title is a bit much), and it's focused on how to work with bad lighting situations.

The only negative I can say is that some of the solutions discussed require having an assistant to hold things for you (pretty unlikely, if you aren't a pro).

But I still think it's a pretty neat book, and I can't wait to read the rest of it (I've gotten through two of the ten sections, so far).

Update: I forgot to mention that one of the things I liked was that it said that the first thing you should do, is, if it looks like a sh*tty lighting situation in advance, try to convince the customer to change the setting (timing, placement, etc) so that it won't be so bad.  But then it acknowledges that sometimes you can't do it.